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Yemen Raid Had Secret Target: Al Qaeda Leader Qassim Al-Rimi
 [NBCNEWS] The Navy SEAL raid in Yemen ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of. Except for a tiny handfull of Jews everthing there is very Islamic... last week had a secret objective -- the head of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula ...the latest incarnation of various Qaeda and Qaeda-allied groups, including the now-defunct Aden-Abyan Islamic Army that boomed the USS Cole in 2000... , who survived and is now taunting President Donald Trump ...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and what ever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th President of the United States... in an audio message. Military and intelligence officials told NBC News the goal of the massive operation was to capture or kill Qassim al-Rimi, considered the third most dangerous terrorist in the world and a master recruiter. But while one SEAL, 14 al Qaeda gunnies and civilians including an 8-year-old girl were killed during a firefight, al-Rimi is still alive and in Yemen, multiple military officials said. On Sunday, al-Rimi -- who landed on the U.S. most-wanted terrorist list after taking over al Qaeda's Yemen affiliate in 2015 -- released an audio recording that military sources said is authentic. "The fool of the White House got slapped at the beginning of his road in your lands," he said in an apparent reference to the Jan. 29 raid. It's not clear if al-Rimi was at the al Qaeda camp but escaped when SEAL Team 6 and Emirati commandos descended, if he happened to be elsewhere, or even if he was tipped off. The White House -- which had declared the raid "a successful operation by all standards" -- had no comment Monday on his escape from death. The Pentagon also declined to comment. Juan Zarate, a national security adviser in the Bush administration and an NBC News analyst, said that even though the raid did not neutralize al-Rimi, it could still yield smaller victories. "Certainly if the goal is to capture the leader of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, that didn't happen. It wasn't successful in that regard," he said. "On the other hand, a number of al Qaeda leaders were killed, and al Qaeda was disrupted, at least in terms of that cell. They understand that the U.S. is willing to lean forward and perhaps they're being deterred or disrupted in their activities. "And we may have collected incredibly valuable intelligence that will lead to further disruptions and further counterterrorism activities down the road." Posted by: Fred 2017-02-07 |
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